Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished | Page 8

mild little creature opened a small mouth
that bore no proportion whatever to the eyes, and attempted to cry, but
the attempt was a failure. It had not strength to cry.
The burly little man's soul was touched to the centre by the sight. He
kissed the baby's forehead, pressed it to his ample breast, and hurried
away. If he had taken time to think he might have gone to a
police-office, or a night refuge, or some such haven of rest for the
weary, but when Twitter's feelings were touched he became a man of
impulse. He did not take time to think--except to the extent that, on
reaching the main thoroughfare, he hailed a cab and was driven home.
The poor mother had followed him with the intention of seeing him
home. Of course the cab put an end to that. She felt comparatively easy,
however, knowing, as she did, that her child was in the keeping of
"Twitter, Slime and ---." That was quite enough to enable her to trace
Mr Twitter out. Comforting herself as well as she could with this
reflection, she sat down in a dark corner on a cold door-step, and,
covering her face with both hands, wept as though her heart would
break.
Gradually her sobs subsided, and, rising, she hurried away, shivering
with cold, for her thin cotton dress was a poor protection against the
night chills, and her ragged shawl was--gone with the baby.
In a few minutes she reached a part of the Whitechapel district where
some of the deepest poverty and wretchedness in London is to be found.
Turning into a labyrinth of small streets and alleys, she paused in the
neighbourhood of the court in which was her home--if such it could be
called.
"Is it worth while going back to him?" she muttered. "He nearly killed
baby, and it wouldn't take much to make him kill me. And oh! he was
so different--once!"
While she stood irresolute, the man of whom she spoke chanced to turn

the corner, and ran against her, somewhat roughly.
"Hallo! is that you?" he demanded, in tones that told too clearly where
he had been spending the night.
"Yes, Ned, it's me. I was just thinking about going home."
"Home, indeed--'stime to b'goin' home. Where'v you bin? The babby 'll
'v bin squallin' pretty stiff by this time."
"No fear of baby now," returned the wife almost defiantly; "it's gone."
"Gone!" almost shouted the husband. "You haven't murdered it, have
you?"
"No, but I've put it in safe keeping, where you can't get at it, and, now I
know that, I don't care what you do to me."
"Ha! we'll see about that. Come along."
He seized the woman by the arm and hurried her towards their
dwelling.
It was little better than a cellar, the door being reached by a descent of
five or six much-worn steps. To the surprise of the couple the door,
which was usually shut at that hour, stood partly open, and a bright
light shone within.
"Wastin' coal and candle," growled the man with an angry oath, as he
approached.
"Hetty didn't use to be so extravagant," remarked the woman, in some
surprise.
As she spoke the door was flung wide open, and an overgrown but very
handsome girl peered out.
"Oh! father, I thought it was your voice," she said. "Mother, is that you?
Come in, quick. Here's Bobby brought home in a cab with a broken

leg."
On hearing this the man's voice softened, and, entering the room, he
went up to a heap of straw in one corner whereon our little friend
Bobby Frog--the street-Arab--lay.
"Hallo! Bobby, wot's wrong with 'ee? You ain't used to come to grief,"
said the father, laying his hand on the boy's shoulder, and giving him a
rough shake.
Things oftentimes "are not what they seem." The shake was the man's
mode of expressing sympathy, for he was fond of his son, regarding
him, with some reason, as a most hopeful pupil in the ways of
wickedness.
"It's o' no use, father," said the boy, drawing his breath quickly and
knitting his brows, "you can't stir me up with a long pole now. I'm past
that."
"What! have 'ee bin runned over?"
"No--on'y run down, or knocked down."
"Who did it? On'y give me his name an' address, an' as sure as my
name's Ned I'll--"
He finished the sentence with a sufficiently expressive scowl and
clenching of a huge fist, which had many a time done great execution
in the prize ring.
"It wasn't a he, father, it was a she."
"Well, no matter, if I on'y had my fingers on her windpipe I'd squeeze it
summat."
"If you did I'd bang your nose! She didn't go for